nonprofits

After my recent post Digital Activism does not = Slacktivism and the discussion that it promoted, there seems to be lots of energy for digital campaigning practitioners to tell their stories and share there wins and fails, to give a more balanced look, on the ground look at what we do.

And, we want you to take part.

Do you have a story, lesson, tips or success stories to share about using digital tools to affect positive social change? If so blog it, tag it# digicampstories, post the link in the comments or tweet me if you would like to be involved in pulling this project together.

Topics we would like to see covered email, mobile, video, web, audio, graphics, social media and how they have been used to attempt or achieve social change.

The project team is forming now and will report back on progress at the E-campaigning Forum in Oxford, UK 2-23 March, Oxford, UK and via FutureMediaChange.com

The Guardian recently posted a blog about digital activism – mostly a nice personal reflection on the author’s positive experience of taking Avaaz actions and how that they feel connected to a wider movement and part of a social change by doing so.

But, the comments to the piece made me reflect on the wider debate on digital activism, particularly the “digital activism=slacktivisim=not real activism” debates of the last year and it left me feeling uneasy.

The uneasiness stems from feeling like I am a spectator in a debate about my area of expertise and passion instead of an active participant, and I know that others feel the same.

It really bugs me that the main commentators called on in this debate are not us or the women using mobile phones in small isolated villages where they save lives by providing and receiving information about health, markets and important civil news or the activists who resist dictatorships and human rights abuses by documenting evidence on videos/mobiles and sharing with the world via the web or the million of us who show our concern and empathy for others by taking part in activities we online and in the real world after reading about them via an email passed on by a friend, a twitter or facebook share we came across.

I am bored to death of seeing academics, pundits and “things were more activist in my day before this internet stuff” campaigners who are driving the debate, putting us into a constant defensive back foot focused on debating the tools rather than how we can use them to work together to achieve the changes we collectively want.

Collectively I think we (and I include me in this) need to step up and start directing this debate. I know we have amazing and inspiring stories, lessons, observations and techniques that if shared, would go some part to changing the tone of the debate into a more rounded discussion that looks at how we can achieve our goals rather than looking backwards to defend the tools we happen to use.

So radically I am suggesting a collective course of action and hope there is some energy in the room for it to run, but first a question.

Why do the current pundits and academics get the media space? Because they are writing/written books that have a PR campaign that provides hooks and ideas for editors to run with and the book gives the writer a authority above their normal role as graduate student, researcher, campaigner to comment in the public sphere.

So my suggestions are that we follow suit.

We collectively write and launch a e-book, or collection of our collective blogs, articles, interviews, and digital know-how. The actual format doesn’t really matter, what does is the buzz that the content generate, as it provides the authors a wider readership, authority and profile, a more knowledgeable sector and a wider range of pundits for media and editors to feature to balance the current cynical and pessimistic tone around most public debate and comment on the impact of digital activism and campaigning

This will mean that fellow campaigners and NGOs can have access to a better understanding of how effective our digital campaigning efforts are, partly informed by our results as well as these debates in the media, and at the moment the digital activism=slacktivism crowd is getting more airspace than us.

To ensure that we do tell our stories in a way that are understood in the way we intended, we need to be seen advocating and developing our own profiles with leading articles rather than justifying ourselves in the comments section.

Staff Time

Nonprofits that use Facebook and Twitter devote on average 5 to 6 staff hours per week on social networking and post to those services at least daily:

Facebook: 6 times per week

Twitter: 4 times per day

Fan / Follower Growth Rate

Because each medium is at a different stage in its maturity, the growth rate of fans / followers / e-mail subscribers varies:

Facebook: 3.75% growth per month

Twitter: 9% growth per month

E-mail: 1.4% growth per month

Meanwhile, organizations are seeing churn rates of

Facebook: 2% per month

E-mail: 1% per month

(Corresponding numbers for Twitter were not available.)

Interestingly, the number of posts a nonprofit makes have a mixed effect on the number of fans:

More posts = more new fans / followers

More posts = more fans / followers leaving

Fan Action

The study says Facebook fans take 2.5 actions (including simple thumbs ups) for every post a organization makes to its page — which is around 3 times the activity seen from e-mail. When the page post is by a fan, the number of resulting fan actions increases to 4 actions per fan. (Corresponding numbers for Twitter were not available.)

I received an urgent, “Action Alert” from our friends at Change.org today with the subject line, “Demand Worldwide Access to Lifesaving Medicine.” I should start by saying that I like the initiative — I support Change’s hands on approach that includes hiring an organizer and being more actively involved in their users’ campaigns. It is a huge added value for their nonprofit clients along with their other recent improvements at the social network for change makers.

I opened the email to investigate further.

Five years ago this past week, a major tsunami struck in the Indian Ocean, causing widespread devastation. The world responded with an immediate outpouring of food and medical supplies.

The callout image does tell me this has to do with, “Lifesaving medical care,” but the first sentence doesn’t tell me what this action is about. Tsunami? Is this related to the Boxing Day Tsunami? Maybe, climate change? Perhaps, we will find more clarity as the email continues?

This year, no headline-grabbing natural disaster struck the nation’s consciousness. But that doesn’t mean worldwide suffering has lessened. On the contrary, we’ve now reached a point where one third of the world’s population – more than 2 billion people – lacks access to the lifesaving medicines and humanitarian aid they need to get through each day.

Unfortunately, when suffering doesn’t make the news, it is easily forgotten.

We have gone three paragraphs and one descriptive link into the email, but I still have no idea what the petition is actually promoting. I don’t know what is THE ASK! We didn’t have a tsunami or a Katrina, but people need “access.” I no longer wanted to sign the petition, but I had to investigate further and go to the link, which is a petition by AmeriCares. Unfortunately, the petition isn’t much help either. By the way, this is the point that I realize that the petition was launched Dec. 26th to coincide with the five year anniversary of the tsunami. Neither Change.org or AmeriCares updated the email, which still says:

Today (emphasis mine), on the anniversary of the tragic tsunami that galvanized people across the globe, you can add your name to the global call asking world leaders to commit to providing access to lifesaving medicine to all the world’s people – whenever they need it.

This is THE ASK. The text on the petition page is even more of a nonspecific mouthful:

Today you can add your name to the global call asking world leaders to join in the effort to fulfill our collective responsibility to increase access to lifesaving medicine to all the world’s people – wherever they are, whenever they need it. Our generation has the power to demand action on behalf of the men, women and children whose survival depends on our help. Your voice will bring us one step closer to that goal.

Let’s deconstruct the ask. The target is “World leaders,” or, as the petition headline says, “TARGETING: The International Community.” “World Leaders” is the shorthand that has become far too common in these type of global petitions for Heads of State. I’m not entirely sure who is, “the International Community.” Is it all of us? Is it international institutions like the UN, World Bank, WHO? At any rate, the target is not defined at worst, and completely amorphous at best. AmeriCares is not alone here. “World leaders” are a favorite target of international NGOs. Sometimes this signals a lack of understanding in who are the actual power players. Other times, this is a byproduct of organizations wanting to target the most powerful HoS (usually Obama) without expressly saying this.

Strike one may be that we don’t know exactly who we are asking to act; strike two is that the action is not explicit. These leaders are being asked to, “…join in the effort to fulfill our collective responsibility to increase access to lifesaving medicine to all the world’s people – wherever they are, whenever they need it.” Huh? World leaders and the international community are being asked to “join in the effort.” Which effort? How exactly will they “fulfill our collective responsibility.”

The petition desperately needs to call for 3-5 very specific actions that will increase access lifesaving medicine and health care. Instead, it is targeting nobody in particular and calling for nothing concrete. AmeriCares may simply be trying to grow their Change.org profile and database, but can’t they ask for something specific even in a general movement building type of petition? If they did, they would find a much higher success rate. As it is, the petition gives the potential signatoy no sense of what will be achieved (how to measure success) or who has the power to achieve the goal (who needs to change for success to be achieved). Can we measure success short of universal health care for every human being?

AmeriCares is asking for my “voice,” but I have no idea why, and I don’t know what my voice can achieve. They end their call to arms with the uplifting sentence, “Our generation has the power to demand action on behalf of the men, women and children whose survival depends on our help.” After reading their petition, I don’t agree. I feel powerless, not empowered. I suppose it is a good thing I’m not “The International Community.” Or, am I?

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